More on Mumia Abu Jamal

I have withheld my opinion that got deleted in the last thread. Those of you who think he is a "political prisoner", read the following.

If there is justice for Officer Daniel Faulker, Mumia will never be free, and will never be remembered as anything but a cold blooded killer.

CONSIDER THE FACTS THAT
CONVICTED MUMIA ABU-JAMAL

Before, during, and after the moment he fired the fatal shot on December 9, 1981, Mumia Abu-Jamal's actions have been consistent with his guilt, and have been consistent with nothing else but his guilt. He has done nothing that an innocent person would do if accused and convicted of murder. All the evidence points to Jamal as the killer. You be the judge.

FACT

As a young man, Jamal had a long history of hatred against the law enforcement officers. While he was a Black Panther, Mumia Abu-Jamal wrote, "I for one feel like putting down the pen....LET'S WRITE EPITAPHS FOR PIGS." Jamal has stated that he used his position in the Black Panthers to call for a "black revolution in America" and that "political power grows from the barrel of a gun."

FACT

A total of five eyewitnesses have testified that they saw Mumia Abu-Jamal run from a parking lot and shoot Officer Faulkner to death as the officer attempted to arrest Jamal's brother. None of these eyewitnesses knew each other. Each gave their accounts within minutes of the shooting, and the accounts agreed with each other in every significant detail. Several of these individuals stated that -- in some cases from less than 30 feet away -- they watched as Jamal repeatedly fired at the fallen and unarmed officer from point blank range. One even stated that Jamal took the time to bend down and fire the final shot into the wounded officer's face from less than a foot away and that the officer's "whole body jerked" when the shot hit his face. Was each and every one of these eyewitnesses - including a man called by Jamal's own lawyers in 1995, Robert Harkins - "confused" about what they saw, as Jamal and his attorneys allege?

FACT

Within a few minutes of the shooting, three of the eyewitnesses personally identified Mumia Abu-Jamal to police at the scene as the man who had shot Officer Faulkner. Again, none of these individuals knew each other. They had no time to find what other witnesses were going to say. Nor was there time for police to "coerce" or "intimidate" them prior to making their identifications. The police had no way of knowing what story to "coerce" witnesses to tell even if they had wanted to. Each witness watched from a different vantage point, and several stated that they never lost sight of Jamal from the moment the shooting stopped, until the police apprehended him and placed him in the van. Were these eyewitnesses all "mistaken" about what they saw, as Jamal and his attorneys now argue?

FACT

Jamal was apprehended only 10 feet away from Officer Faulkner's body. In his chest, Jamal had a bullet fired from Officer Faulkner's gun. If the officer was shot by a "phantom killer," as Jamal's lawyers contend, he would have shot the gunman, not Jamal. The eyewitnesses all said that Jamal shot the officer in the back before the officer even knew Jamal was there.

FACT

The gun found next to Jamal was owned by Jamal and registered in his name. Does an "innocent man" run to the scene of an arrest with his gun in his hand if he doesn't intend to use it?

FACT

Jamal's gun contained five spent casings from unique high velocity special +P ammunition. These casings were the exact brand (Federal), caliber (.38) and type (high velocity +P with a hollow base) of ammunition retrieved from Officer Faulkner's brain. Is it reasonable to believe that an "innocent man" just happened to load his gun with exact same ammunition that the "real killer" used in his gun?

FACT

The rifling characteristics of the bullet removed from Officer Faulkner's brain showed that it was fired from a barrel with 8 lands and grooves and a right hand direction of twist. This is identical to the rifling characteristics of the barrel of Jamal's gun. Is it a coincidence that an "innocent man" just happened to load his gun with the same unique ammunition as the "real killer" AND have the same riffling pattern in the barrel of his gun as the "real killer"?

FACT

Jamal's brother, William Cook, saw the murder unfold. When police arrived at the scene -- less than one minute after the shooting -- they found Cook against a wall a few feet away from the dead officer's body. Cook's only comment was, "I ain't got nothin to do with this." Would not the brother of an "innocent man" say something like, "The guy who shot the cop ran away." or "My brother didn't do it"? In fact, to this day, Cook is the only known eyewitness (other than Jamal himself) who has never testified to what he saw. He has never so much as suggested that his brother might be innocent.

FACT

The jury knew that William Cook was the closest person to the murder. Yet the jury never heard Cook testify on his brother's behalf. It does not require a degree in rocket science to understand the significance of the fact that Cook would allow his brother to be sentenced to death rather than testify to his supposed innocence. Is it believable that an "innocent" Mumia Abu-Jamal would simply accept his brother's silence and not demand to have him testify to his innocence in order to save him from conviction?

FACT

On June 21, 1982 , Officer Faulkner's blood stained shirt was displayed in the courtroom. Jamal deliberately turned around and grinned at Officer Faulkner's widow as her husband's shirt was displayed. Several witnesses saw this. Such a calculated act of evil is not characteristic of an innocent man.

FACT

Throughout the trial and at the sentencing hearing the jury saw Mumia Abu-Jamal explode with loud violent outbursts, obscenities, verbal threats and diatribes against the judge, the prosecutor, his own attorney, and even the jurors themselves. Were these the acts of an "innocent man"?

FACT

Jamal insulted and refused to speak with the lawyer he himself had selected prior to trial. He then refused to be represented by any lawyer at all. Instead, he demanded to have John Africa, the leader of a radical cult called MOVE, act as his lawyer. Would an "innocent man" concerned with keeping his freedom, as opposed to making his trial a political forum, make such absurd demands? Or would an "innocent man" work to provide his highly qualified and experienced attorney -- an attorney he hand picked -- with every bit of information and evidence he could muster that supported his innocence?

FACT

Though given two chances (the trial in 1982 and the PCRA hearing in 1996) to take the stand and explain his alleged "innocence," Mumia Abu-Jamal has refused to do so. In fact, he has refused to tell anyone what really happened on the morning Officer Faulkner was murdered; including the legion of reporters from around the world who line up to interview him. Would an "innocent man" keep the facts that prove his supposed innocence a secret?

FACT

At his sentencing hearing, Mumia Abu Jamal threatened Judge Albert Sabo in front of the entire courtroom when he said, "I'm going to tell you one thing: You have sentenced yourself, just like Judge Malmed, just like Malcolm, just like Merna Marshal, and every other Judge who dares to sit up there and act like you got some justice. You are wrong. You have just been sentenced to death. You have just been convicted!" (N.T. 5/25/83, 165)

Hi
well i dont like cops at all (maybe a bit more than this jamal freak) cops dont do their jobs at all. they harass the wrong people and when we tell them exactly what happened they act dumb and waste time and our tax money.

but for murder, his brother would not have lived to testify if he didnt do exactly as he said....which is keep silent about it all.

i say for murder, rape, crimes against humanity and child sex offenders, it should be a bullett. no worries, no more prisons, no more statistics that just bull**it you all damn day long.

i for one hope bush starts something really big, NOTHING NUCLEAR OR CHEMICAL for all humandkinds sake, and i hope by the end of it all the world will be a better place.

well if i ever become president of 'the land down under' theres gonna be a lot of changes...as for usa....i hope those crazy jihad bin somethin's bombs go up when they are plannin it so they all are 'missing or presumed dead in the course of action'

Hey Bruce..for one, I care. I am just trying to refute some of the "he's innocent" drivel on the other, now closed, thread. I just noticed where you are from. Brighton is near and dear to my heart, even though I haven't been there since I was a teenager. My mother was born and raised in Hove.

So your contention, based on your "facts" is that you know with zero posssibility of being wrong, that he is guilty?

Sorry, I just don't put that much faith in what others say or decide. You've obviously put a great deal of effort into this, why I'm not sure. Just for grins go back and read your facts, this time with some objectivity, and see if what you posted truly proved, beyond ALL doubt, his guilt. I'm not going to go down the list, I don't have the energy and it sounds like your mind is made up anyway. I do see lots of holes in the logic.

Me, I wasn't there and I truly don't know, one way or the other. I do know that it is entirely possible that everything you posted does not necessarily HAVE to be true. Any problems with that or do you feel circumstantial evidence is enough to support a death sentence?

I'm not going to post an opinion going either way. Thats why the last thread got closed down. All i'm going to say is, there is alot more evidence than is going to be presented in newspapers or where ever it is you got your information from. As well as there will be more evidence than say activist such as RATM will present. We cannot (or at least we should not) base our oppinions entirely upon this. I am strongly against the death penalty. If we live eye for an eye eventually everyone will be blind. Maybe Mumia's trial ended with the correct decision, but on the other hand maybe it didn't. I know of no man on this earth who I feel should have the right to deal out death to others.

why do you spend all your time money and energy trying to convince someone that he is guilty when it is apparent that he is the guilty party.

the legal system has too many loopholes, just cause someone is mentally unfit to stand trial is damn crap and you know it.

lemme put it like this, someone breaks into your house steals everything and kills your family(and whatever else he does). would you wanna see him walk down the same street as you just cause he is mentally unfit to stand trial, i say he is mentally unfit to live in this world.

a man raped and killed my uncles girlfriend, she was pregnant with my uncles child. this person stayed at the crime scene and told my uncle everything would be alright and they would find the person who did all that horrible stuff. he was caught and admitted to doing everything, that was almost 20 years ago. he got out of prison and within 2 months died (natural causes). why did he get to live the rest of his life in shelter when he took the lives of 2 others so brutally.

and you sit there and call me ignorant, its people like you who set these criminals free so they can re offend.

well i dont like cops at all (maybe a bit more than this jamal freak) cops dont do their jobs at all. they harass the wrong people and when we tell them exactly what happened they act dumb and waste time and our tax money.

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Luke...sorry for what happened to your family member. The quote above was the ignorance I was referring to. It's a generalization, which are almost always untrue. If I said I hated all Australians, or all blacks, or all Muslims, would I not be a bigot? Your statement is no less silly and bigoted.

Brad, I respect your point of view, but I certainly am convinced Mumia is guilty, and is playing the political prisoner/race card for God knows what purposes. Am I 100 percent sure? I guess not, but pretty darn close. I guess there is really only one person who knows 100 percent for sure, and that is Mumia. He's not likely to tell the truth anytime soon. As an aside, I am generally agaisnt the death penalty, but the cold blooded killing of cop with no provocation is an exception to me.

Originally posted by cheezewiz Brad, I respect your point of view, but I certainly am convinced Mumia is guilty, and is playing the political prisoner/race card for God knows what purposes. Am I 100 percent sure? I guess not, but pretty darn close. I guess there is really only one person who knows 100 percent for sure, and that is Mumia. He's not likely to tell the truth anytime soon. As an aside, I am generally agaisnt the death penalty, but the cold blooded killing of cop with no provocation is an exception to me.

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Cheeze, I respect your opinion too... I hope you realize that. I'm not saying he's not guilty. I don't know enough about it to feel strongly one way or another.

I think it's completely understandable why he would fight this, guilty or innocent.

One last thing I have to comment on though is the 100% thing. There should be more than one person in your first post who is 100% sure. The witnesses should be 100% sure. The jury should also be 100% sure. He will be 100% dead and they should be as certain as the finality of his execution IMO. Anything less is a recipe for disaster for at least one person.

Witnesses recant all the time. The thing that bothers me about this situation is the "what if's?".

Luke...sorry for what happened to your family member. The quote above was the ignorance I was referring to. It's a generalization, which are almost always untrue. If I said I hated all Australians, or all blacks, or all Muslims, would I not be a bigot? Your statement is no less silly and bigoted.

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Hi
yeah sorry for trying to shoot you down like that.

i can see what you mean now, i was getting all flamed up over nothing at all. let me tell you why i dont think police are doing their jobs.

3 of my friends got bashed with hockey sticks by some kids, the cops watched the whole thing happen from less than shouting distance away and they did nothing, my friend walked up to a cop with blood trickling down his face and not one "protector of the innocent" even asked what happened.

my friend said "what are you all going to do about this", and the cops ignored him. the kids that bashed my friends had just done a b+e (break and enter) theft (to steal the hockey equiptment) and vandalism to the place in question and did the cops really care......NO.

right where i am sitting now, looking out a big glass window, i can see many many 'native australians' walking past with coke-a-cola bottles held up to their mouths. they put spray-paint in the bottles and sniff it, partly cause theyre not allowed to buy petrol to sniff.

what kind of a world are we coming to when idiots can get away with blue murder and theft, grevious bodily harm, grand theft auto and countless other things and our police who "protect and serve the innocent" sit on the sides of the roads with speed cameras booking hard working people who are just a bit late for work or that doctors appointment.

now i feel the need to point out that im in australia, your world is much different to mine im assuming. i could tell you hundreds more stories like the one above that leans towards the 'cops are lazy' side, but i wont. people have to make up their own minds about the world around them.